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SwSh Pokemon Home

Basically make it like a stripped down Pokemon game itself.

Essentially a Pokemon Essential mode or an expanded PokePelago combined with a PokeWalker.

* Exploration Mode:
You can assemble a team of 1, 3, or 6 Pokemon, point to a themed place on the map and "Walk" through it encountering wild Pokemon you can capture and randomly generated NPC trainers you can battle. They could be new places or themed around old game areas like Viridian Forest.

Then for connectivity features:
  • A Pokemon Daycare that raises the level of your Pokemon and allows you to breed.
  • A Pokemon School to teach moves.
  • The ability to battle and trade with other players.
A Pokemonami-style minigame where you can pet Pokemon and/or Pokethlon and Pokemon Contests would be nice but not something essential.

If they did most of that, I'm willing to forgive curated Pokemon collections in main titles.

I'd be fine if this was all done with sprites instead of models, btw.

If not, it's just a collection of pixels with no interactivity that you have to pay a subscription for? I'm dropping the series entirely.
Please make this happen. Seriously. As long as I can interact with the Pokémon I can't transfer in some way, it won't feel like a waste. All the shiny hunts I could complete...

Hey, they could even have our Pokémon raising Berries that we could send to our games via Mystery Gift! Or they could bring back the Dream World as a seasonal campaign.... Yeah, give us things to do with our Pokémon and I'm good.
 
I'm mostly upset with this because I always move my Pokemon around in teams. I keep my old Pokemon organized in rows of 6 from each consecutive playthrough. So now what, I only get to move half a team while their teammates are stuck in limbo forever? And on top of that I have a whole box full of Pokemon I've worked hard to breed. You're telling me now I can bring that perfect Pelipper of mine, but not my perfect Plusle?

I hate to be negative about things but this upsets me.

I do this exact same thing; I can't just bring over my Diamond team's Roselia, Luxray, and Staraptor... and not also bring Dialga, Bibarel, and Torterra!

They should have put the all Pokémon in first before everything else. There was a reason Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's "Everyone is Here!" strategy worked.

Ohana means family! Family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten!

Seriously though:
how could this have been a "time management" issue? Sorting out the Pokemon and integrating the new batch into the previously established roster should be Number One on the list, the first thing they have sorted out. I'd hate to think they didn't finish building all the old Pokemon new models in time because they were too busy working on Dynamaxing...

Basically make it like a stripped down Pokemon game itself.

Essentially a Pokemon Essential mode or an expanded PokePelago combined with a PokeWalker.

* Exploration Mode:
You can assemble a team of 1, 3, or 6 Pokemon, point to a themed place on the map and "Walk" through it encountering wild Pokemon you can capture and randomly generated NPC trainers you can battle. They could be new places or themed around old game areas like Viridian Forest.

Then for connectivity features:
  • A Pokemon Daycare that raises the level of your Pokemon and allows you to breed.
  • A Pokemon School to teach moves.
  • The ability to battle and trade with other players.
A Pokemonami-style minigame where you can pet Pokemon and/or Pokethlon and Pokemon Contests would be nice but not something essential.

If they did most of that, I'm willing to forgive curated Pokemon collections in main titles.

I'd be fine if this was all done with sprites instead of models, btw.

If not, it's just a collection of pixels with no interactivity that you have to pay a subscription for? I'm dropping the series entirely.

I love this! had a similar idea to this, and honestly I think it would solve most issues. Storage should earn you some form of in-game currency (similar to Bank earning you Poke Miles just from having your Pokemon stored there) and then you can use that in-game currency to buy trade-evolution items or level-up your Pokemon or teach them new moves, so Pokemon Home can truly be a central hub for training and battling.
 
biggest thing im afraid of is home being a glorified pokemon bank, where my pokemon will just sit. i want to bring them out to fight and hopefully do some other stuff like contests
from what i've read, there will be playable features? so hopefully that's a good sign
also, if it costs money every month or every year, im gonna be forced to keep my pokemon in pokemon moon possibly indefinitely? most are in X so they may just stay there
 
Masuda said in an interview that part of the reason for this decision is that the roster of Pokémon was becoming too unwieldy. They chose to trim the fat as a result.

So I guess here’s the question I have: in future generations, would you rather have absolutely zero new Pokémon, but be able to use all Pokémon from Gens 1-8, OR would you rather have new Pokémon, but have some of the old Pokémon completely cut off?

Apparently there’s no in-between anymore.
 
Someone on Tumblr has translated a recent interview with Masuda and Ohmori, clarifying more details into both Home and the cutting of certain Pokémon.

1: Masuda is just as upset as we are over the culling. He wanted SwSh to include the first seven generations of Pokémon, but can't if it means higher quality animation.
2: They've still not decided on whether to patch in left-out Pokémon.
3: There will be over 1,000 Pokémon, alternate forms counting.
4: Home will have playable features, which means it's going to be more than just Bank+. Pokémon not in the Galar Dex will still play some role in Home, so they're definitely not been forgotten.
5: Mega Evolutions and Z-Moves will not be included in SwSh.

The cutting of Mega Evolutions is a major disappointment, but I have my hopes later games will restore them. Meanwhile, the fact that Home will function more as storage is great news, and I hope the later app that allows you to challenge previous trainers in major games will connect with Home, and give the left-out Pokémon the justice they need.
 
Masuda said in an interview that part of the reason for this decision is that the roster of Pokémon was becoming too unwieldy. They chose to trim the fat as a result.

So I guess here’s the question I have: in future generations, would you rather have absolutely zero new Pokémon, but be able to use all Pokémon from Gens 1-8, OR would you rather have new Pokémon, but have some of the old Pokémon completely cut off?

Apparently there’s no in-between anymore.

unweildy my butt its largely becase game freak doesn;'t hire to many new employees or out source development

i rather have them do clean break sorta like black and white were if that was the case
 
So I've had it explained to me as that they're going to pick and choose which old mons get to return, and it will be a limited number of them each time. So we can't be guaranteed on who is going to return and when. My biggest problem with this is they have the tendency to not let a pokemon come back AT ALL. Even beside that, we wouldn't be able to make random teams from any pokemon we choose anymore. That is one of the best things about Pokemon.

I can see their argument, but I find it to be a bad business decision. They put their customers under the bus so that they can have it easier. This has happened for a long time, where the only reason they put the older pokemon in there was for the battle facilities and to put extra pokemon in the game for the postgame. For them, there is no other purpose for them to be there other than the matter the fans wanted them to be there. What we see in the main game is what their vision of the regions is supposed to be. Putting the old pokemon in was a massive burden for them, and we should've gotten the clue when older pokemon have now become a lot harder to come by and Bank is now our major source for maintaining them.

Maybe they're right, and something like this was inevitable. Pokemon was the only series that has done this, have an ever increasing cast of characters that go forward all the time, but this is very stifling from a design standpoint. Most game series get all their variety from the matter they have to reinvent the wheel for each entry. There is no maintaining the enemies, they have to design new ones all the time. This allows them to evolve and innovate. Pokemon has done this, too, but in a more limited fashion. Is this the real reason why we haven't had a lot of new pokemon since gen 5?

I understand everyone wanting to have their choice, but I must reiterate that we were spoiled on that matter. No other series does this at all. Yes, that does make Pokemon unique, but is it sustainable? They seemed to be doing fine with relegating all that business to postgame, after all, that is when all the real training takes place, right? At that rate, maybe competitive and collecting have become a realm separate from the main games and need something else to support it.

I do not think making people choose one or the other is a solution. It has long been my stance that we should all be able to have what we want. I thought that we were going to have the possibility that we could have all our pokemon in a game again. That doesn't seem to be the case anymore. I see their point that design wise, there is no way that can be done. It has even been apparent in the fandom that either you just want to battle, or you just want to adventure. They cannot coexist. While variety is good for both, balance cannot be maintained with that many creatures for battle, and having enriching content can't be done when most of the game is swamped with creatures.

I feel I must say I am not saying that they should stop making new pokemon altogether, that is one of the things that people most look forward to. I am saying that we are perhaps going to have to live with only a limited amount of pokemon being in each game. We have gone beyond critical mass, and this sort of thing was unsustainable no matter how you look at it. Heck, even if you want to ignore all that, you're just going to keep designing new creatures? You're going to run out of ideas eventually. You might argue that means that the series has run it's course. It's time for it to end. I'll leave that for you to decide. It will happen at some point, whether it's now or later.

So what about being able to use all your pokemon? If the games themselves can't do it, we need something else that can. I do not think this is what they plan to do with Home, since if that was a thing, I would think they would've said so. Then again, I don't know if they've said everything they wanted to say about that. In order to do that, they would need to store items, too, and we don't know about that either. To store items, everything from Sword and Shield would have to be maintained from that point forward. They are also burdened by keeping items as a legacy, so I don't think that's likely. For any dedicated battle program, they would need to both support all pokemon AND all currently existing items. You're asking for a program that can somehow put item data from one source onto a pokemon from another source. (and they would need to update the item list every time it changes)

I want to be able to use any pokemon I want, too, but outside of a dedicated program for it, I don't see how that can be done.
 
Masuda said in an interview that part of the reason for this decision is that the roster of Pokémon was becoming too unwieldy. They chose to trim the fat as a result.

So I guess here’s the question I have: in future generations, would you rather have absolutely zero new Pokémon, but be able to use all Pokémon from Gens 1-8, OR would you rather have new Pokémon, but have some of the old Pokémon completely cut off?

Apparently there’s no in-between anymore.

If they decided to just totally embrace the crazy and made EVERY generation a Black and White (with 151 new Pokemon) I could see that working out.

If they decide to half-ass it and just do 70 new Pokemon each gen like they've been doing, that won't please anyone. It's not enough new content to justify the cuts.

If they decide to add no new Pokemon it's not sustainable because they won't change up the formula from "collect teh badges". The games already suffer from being nothing more than virtual vacations (Looks we puts the Pikachu in England background gives us 60 bucks plz).

The problem is the way they handle the series' narrative and setting. The narrative is ALWAYS just a bunch of sports fanatics training to win at sports. The setting is always just a real life location with some names changed. That lore is too shallow to be used in a narrative driven series, which is what the games would have to become if they stopped adding new Pokemon.
 
So I've had it explained to me as that they're going to pick and choose which old mons get to return, and it will be a limited number of them each time. So we can't be guaranteed on who is going to return and when. My biggest problem with this is they have the tendency to not let a pokemon come back AT ALL. Even beside that, we wouldn't be able to make random teams from any pokemon we choose anymore. That is one of the best things about Pokemon.

I can see their argument, but I find it to be a bad business decision. They put their customers under the bus so that they can have it easier. This has happened for a long time, where the only reason they put the older pokemon in there was for the battle facilities and to put extra pokemon in the game for the postgame. For them, there is no other purpose for them to be there other than the matter the fans wanted them to be there. What we see in the main game is what their vision of the regions is supposed to be. Putting the old pokemon in was a massive burden for them, and we should've gotten the clue when older pokemon have now become a lot harder to come by and Bank is now our major source for maintaining them.

Maybe they're right, and something like this was inevitable. Pokemon was the only series that has done this, have an ever increasing cast of characters that go forward all the time, but this is very stifling from a design standpoint. Most game series get all their variety from the matter they have to reinvent the wheel for each entry. There is no maintaining the enemies, they have to design new ones all the time. This allows them to evolve and innovate. Pokemon has done this, too, but in a more limited fashion. Is this the real reason why we haven't had a lot of new pokemon since gen 5?

I understand everyone wanting to have their choice, but I must reiterate that we were spoiled on that matter. No other series does this at all. Yes, that does make Pokemon unique, but is it sustainable? They seemed to be doing fine with relegating all that business to postgame, after all, that is when all the real training takes place, right? At that rate, maybe competitive and collecting have become a realm separate from the main games and need something else to support it.

I do not think making people choose one or the other is a solution. It has long been my stance that we should all be able to have what we want. I thought that we were going to have the possibility that we could have all our pokemon in a game again. That doesn't seem to be the case anymore. I see their point that design wise, there is no way that can be done. It has even been apparent in the fandom that either you just want to battle, or you just want to adventure. They cannot coexist. While variety is good for both, balance cannot be maintained with that many creatures for battle, and having enriching content can't be done when most of the game is swamped with creatures.

I feel I must say I am not saying that they should stop making new pokemon altogether, that is one of the things that people most look forward to. I am saying that we are perhaps going to have to live with only a limited amount of pokemon being in each game. We have gone beyond critical mass, and this sort of thing was unsustainable no matter how you look at it. Heck, even if you want to ignore all that, you're just going to keep designing new creatures? You're going to run out of ideas eventually. You might argue that means that the series has run it's course. It's time for it to end. I'll leave that for you to decide. It will happen at some point, whether it's now or later.

So what about being able to use all your pokemon? If the games themselves can't do it, we need something else that can. I do not think this is what they plan to do with Home, since if that was a thing, I would think they would've said so. Then again, I don't know if they've said everything they wanted to say about that. In order to do that, they would need to store items, too, and we don't know about that either. To store items, everything from Sword and Shield would have to be maintained from that point forward. They are also burdened by keeping items as a legacy, so I don't think that's likely. For any dedicated battle program, they would need to both support all pokemon AND all currently existing items. You're asking for a program that can somehow put item data from one source onto a pokemon from another source. (and they would need to update the item list every time it changes)

I want to be able to use any pokemon I want, too, but outside of a dedicated program for it, I don't see how that can be done.

Here's the thing... I understand the argument for removing Pokemon from the roster. All these points make sense. But they also made just as much sense years ago.

GameFreak has made a point so far of always being able to move your old Pokemon forward to the latest adventure; in fact, when they launched Pokemon Bank, it was billed as a way to guarantee that veteran players would always be able to carry their Pokemon with them for a lifetime.

It makes total sense to retcon unpopular or problematic Pokemon from the available roster to curb development time. But why now after years of making a point of NOT doing so?

Gen V was the perfect point for such a reboot– implementing facilities for Deoxys various Formes, all the different convoluted evolutionary methods, even back then it was getting a bit much. But they put the time in and made it work.

In X and Y, they made it work still– even implementing niche items like the Gracidea Flower and DNA Splicers just for those Extra Special Veterans who brought particular Legendary and Mythical Pokemon with them to Kalos.

And then in Sun and Moon also, when the National Dex was starting to get even more ridiculous, they still went out of their way to shoehorn in a place for Magneton to evolve, ensure things like the Dusk Stone and King's Rock would be available, and make sure the Ice Rock and Moss Rock (which are both only for Eevee's benefit, mind!) were all in their proper place... even though there was no National Pokedex, they decided to just push ahead and take the time to cross every t and dot every i.

Then, one generation later, after years upon years of emphasising that moving your collection from one Generation of games to the next so your old friends can stay with you would remain a core philosophy, they finally decide to confirm they will drop support for about 300+ Pokemon... It's confusing and feels like a betrayal because they spent years essentially saying "Your old Pokemon are important and we will always respect that" and seemingly designing the games with exactly that tenant in mind.

If this was an inevitability, why did they wait until now, instead of 3, 5, 8, or 10 years ago when it made just as much sense?
 
I'm not sad about the transferences thing, as I use it only for completing trade evolutions in the regional dex. What makes me sad is the removal of those Pokémon in the game code, as it's the pinnacle of Game Freak's obsession with regional dexes that started with SM when the National Pokedex was removed. I was no longer able to see Marshtomp's dex entry, but at least I know I could get the chance to get it and play with it. Now that opportunity doesn't exist anymore, GTS and Wonder Trade are going to suck even more.

Every time Shuffle and Go get new updates, nobody complains about how there are just too many Pokemon, actually it's the opposite, they get happier and excited. The arguments GF uses just don't make sense, as we've seen that the models are the same and that the animations are very similar to previous ones. Maybe if they had shown a feature that proves that modelling is complicated (like Walking Pokémon...) people would've been more forgiving.

Home needs to have not only minigames, but also a Pokedex with every previous feature available to make up for the money and time you invested in all games. But I'm not expecting more than a different version of Pokepelago.

The only good thing about this is that i's unlikely that any Pokemon will spend a full generation without being available, including Unown, legendaries and mythicals. But the issue will only get worse with time, Go players will be really upset when a Pokemon they transferred from Go hoping to be a competitive one in SWSH is trapped in Home forever.
 
The thing about that is, yes, I don't think Gamefreak understands that team diversity is important to us. Though that is another question as to why they all of a sudden got more concerned about the individual narrative the game possesses over the gameplay. To them, this IS fixing the gameplay so that they can balance it better. Indeed, I don't agree with them on this because Pokemon was never balanced and they should stop pretending it is. I still think they were aware of this problem for some time, but it has persisted for so long now that they can't ignore it anymore. And again, okay, so what if we just let you have all the pokemon you want and things can go back to the way they were? If they do do that, then are doing it just for the sake of the fans, it doesn't benefit them at all, at least not from a design standpoint. You might say placating the fans is more important. How happy can we be if the game has to suffer because of what we want? Now we have more pokemon than game itself. Is that what you want? If so, then go to Showdown and you can have that regardless. (yes I know my previous line of thought is essentially that, too, but I meant an official version of it, not a fan game, and it would exist ALONGSIDE the main series)

Some have made the argument that they can just take more time to do both things. That depends on a lot of things, primarily, who exactly is stipulating that they have to have a game every year? Why do they have this agreement?

This is still irrelevant to the matter at hand. Do we want there to be more pokemon than there is game?
 
This is still irrelevant to the matter at hand. Do we want there to be more pokemon than there is game?

I think part of the problem is that there's not much "game" to begin with and never has been. There's a loose sports narrative and a world map that is essentially a spruced up Google Earth that exists to be a framework for the Pokemon to exist in. Once you start removing Pokemon from the framework, it can easily collapse like a Jenga tower.

GameFreak could use this as an opportunity to make the framework into an actual game that the Pokemon happen to exist in, but from what we've already seen of Sword and Shield's story and world, they haven't - at least not this time.
 
Is it even possible to have a world that comprehensive AND that many creatures in one game at once? Nothing can even get remotely close to what pokemon has in terms of unique models, and that's even without the programming associated to them.
 
Someone on Tumblr has translated a recent interview with Masuda and Ohmori, clarifying more details into both Home and the cutting of certain Pokémon.

1: Masuda is just as upset as we are over the culling. He wanted SwSh to include the first seven generations of Pokémon, but can't if it means higher quality animation.
2: They've still not decided on whether to patch in left-out Pokémon.
3: There will be over 1,000 Pokémon, alternate forms counting.
4: Home will have playable features, which means it's going to be more than just Bank+. Pokémon not in the Galar Dex will still play some role in Home, so they're definitely not been forgotten.
5: Mega Evolutions and Z-Moves will not be included in SwSh.

The cutting of Mega Evolutions is a major disappointment, but I have my hopes later games will restore them. Meanwhile, the fact that Home will function more as storage is great news, and I hope the later app that allows you to challenge previous trainers in major games will connect with Home, and give the left-out Pokémon the justice they need.

Honestly, this kind of makes me feel a bit better about the situation. While it still isn't ideal, I can at least understand why they were in a tight spot in regards to keeping all of the Pokemon at the expense of the animation quality. Admittedly, I haven't seen a huge difference in the model for older Pokemon just yet, but we also haven't seen a lot of footage from the games yet. Masuda originally wanting to include everything also kind of helps. The Tumblr posts also mentioned that the idea was brought up for Sun/Moon, which might have been a worse time to do it in a way. The backlash might have been a bit less given the technical differences between a 3DS and a Switch, but people still probably would have been pretty upset given that the DS and 3DS had backwards compatibility. Plus, doing this during the franchise's 20th anniversary would have been really bad timing. I wouldn't be surprised if those were two reasons why they decided to not do that for the seventh generation.

If that translation about Pokemon reaching to over 1,000 Pokemon is correct, then that kind of makes the decision more understandable in a sense. Even with counting for alternate forms, that would mean that there should be at least one hundred new Pokemon, which is more than what we have gotten for the past couple of generations and that could have factored into any technical issues with including all of the previous generations. It might have helped if they had explained more about Pokemon Home before this announcement. Part of the backlash came from how people thought that their Pokemon would be forgotten or left in Home forever useless. Knowing that Home would provide more than just a storage service might have helped reduce the initial backlash at least a bit. I'm not too surprised that Z-Moves aren't in the games, but I am a bit surprised and disappointed that Mega Evolutions are cut as well. Considering that Leon has a Charizard, I thought they'd love to have a Dynamax Mega Charizard X, but maybe that was one of the reasons why it was cut if they didn't want to make Dynamax too overpowered.

I'm still no expert on how video game programming works, so I don't know if it is more plausible to include all of the Pokemon available right from the start than what Game Freak is saying. But it does still sound like they were in kind of a tricky situation where they'd get backlash regardless of which option they'd take. Admittedly, it is still a disappointing decision and I don't blame people for being upset to a degree either. I just don't think that this is an instant deal breaker when everything else shown at last week's Pokemon Direct and the Treehouse Live event at E3 made the games look fantastic. Not to mention all of the new Pokemon so far look pretty great and knowing that we could be getting so many more sounds pretty awesome. I still hope that they'll eventually be able to patch in more Pokemon into the games. I'm not sure how likely that is if they're still undecided about making updates, but it does leave that possibility open at least.
 
I don't know if they mean to let you battle pokemon in Home. That seems to be the only thing that could at least somewhat reduce everyone's concerns. Again, they would have to somehow include all items in there too.
 
"Pokémon Home: Is the 'Home' for all your Pokémon. If a Pokémon is compatible with a game, it will leave for an adventure. If the Pokémon is not native to a certain region because is too cold for them, then they will stay in 'Home' waiting for their next adventure."

See guys? I do have insider info:

Sure, they can always come "back Home," which I suppose is how they're interpreting that software - as a place to store your Pokémon, so that when you travel to a new game's region, you can take along the ones that do appear in that region's Pokédex with you, and then you all go back, along with any new friends you made, to await the next adventure.

Jokes aside, I do think there seems to be more to Home than it appears. I wonder if they'll be fast-tracking those announcements in an attempt to put out some of the fires.

Also I'm pretty sure we already had 1,000 Pokémon if alternate forms were counted. Even ignoring the game-locked ones like Spiky-Eared Pichu or Heart Tail Eevee, we had 809 base designs, and then 98 sex differences, 18 Alola Forms, 48 Mega Evolutions, 2 Primal Reversions, 27 Unown, 3 Castform, 3 Deoxys, 2 Burmy, 2 Wormadam, 1 Cherrim, 1 Shellos, 1 Gastrodon, 5 Rotom, 1 Giratina, 1 Shaymin, 17 Arceus, 1 Basculin, 1 Darmanitan, 3 Deerling, 3 Sawsbuck, 3 Therians, 2 Kyurem, 1 Keldeo, 1 Meloetta, 4 Genesect, Ash-Greninja, 19 Vivillon, 4 Flabébé, 4(+1) Floette, 4 Florges, 9 Furfrou, 1 Aegislash, 3 Pumpkaboo, 3 Gourgeist, 1 Xerneas, 2 Zygarde, 1 Hoopa, 3 Oricorio, 2 Lycanroc, 1 Wishiwashi, 17 Silvally, 7 Minior, 3 Necrozma, (1 Magearna), and 1 Mimikyu if you count the busted one. That's at least 1143, I think.
 
my Friend has a question though i thought i would ask here
does anyone ctully know how big a single pokemon is gamewise (all the other infor not the one you caught perse) because maybe there trying to kepep the gam under a certain size
 
Then, one generation later, after years upon years of emphasising that moving your collection from one Generation of games to the next so your old friends can stay with you would remain a core philosophy, they finally decide to confirm they will drop support for about 300+ Pokemon... It's confusing and feels like a betrayal because they spent years essentially saying "Your old Pokemon are important and we will always respect that" and seemingly designing the games with exactly that tenant in mind.

If this was an inevitability, why did they wait until now, instead of 3, 5, 8, or 10 years ago when it made just as much sense?

Well, I mean, the thing is that they haven't actually gotten rid of transferring. I myself initially thought it was odd that they didn't run up against this wall and simply declare a hard reboot just to get it over with, but upon reflection, I think that's because they clearly do still care about allowing people to bring their old Pokémon with them, or else they wouldn't bother developing the Home software at all, which would indeed be a "betrayal" compared to their previous words. But here we are, still with the ability to keep carrying our Pokémon forward. What's changed is that they've had to make a compromise - you can keep bringing your Pokémon forward, but they might not be supported by every future game. But, where they are supported, they can come out of Home and help you out. It's not a perfect solution, but if their claims about why they've had to do this are to be believed (and we know that Masuda is well aware of the disappointment people felt when this last occurred), it's at least an attempt at finding a solution that allows generational transference to continue while also taking some of the pressure off of the developers and allowing the games to be produced on time. They could have just as easily said, "Sorry, we just can't support transferring anymore, so we'll be starting over anew. Please understand..." but it seems like they've tried to mitigate what damage they could for now, and even gave the audience fair warning well ahead of time even though they must have known that it would cause a backlash against them and spoil some of the excitement that they're trying to generate for these games.

Again, I get why people are upset about this, and there definitely does remain an uncertainty about it because it remains to be seen if they'll develop patches (which I don't automatically see why they couldn't do, but then, I know nothing about programming) and, even if not, if they'll actually use subsequent games to give the spotlight to Pokémon that weren't forefronted in Sword & Shield as implied. But at the same time, it's not like they aren't trying at all (unless the issues they describe are all a great big Dynamaxed lie).
 
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Well, I mean, the thing is that they haven't actually gotten rid of transferring. I myself initially thought it was odd that they didn't run up against this wall and simply declare a hard reboot just to get it over with, but upon reflection, I think that's because they clearly do still care about allowing people to bring their old Pokémon with them, or else they wouldn't bother developing the Home software at all, which would indeed be a "betrayal" compared to their previous words. But here we are, still with the ability to keep carrying our Pokémon forward. What's changed is that they've had to make a compromise - you can keep bringing your Pokémon forward, but they might not be supported by every future game. But, where they are supported, they can come out of Home and help you out. It's not a perfect solution, but if their claims about why they've had to do this are to be believed (and we know that Masuda is well aware of the disappointment people felt when this last occurred), it's at least an attempt at finding a solution that allows generational transference to continue while also taking some of the pressure off of the developers and allowing the games to be produced on time. They could have just as easily said, "Sorry, we just can't support transferring anymore, so we'll be starting over anew. Please understand..." but it seems like they've tried to mitigate what damage they could for now; and even gave the audience fair warning well ahead of time even though they must have known that it would cause a backlash against them and spoil some of the excitement that they're trying to generate for these games.

Again, I get why people are upset about this, and there definitely does remain an uncertainty about it because it remains to be seen if they'll develop patches (which I don't automatically see why they couldn't do, but then, I know nothing about programming) and, even if not, if they'll actually use subsequent games to give the spotlight to Pokémon that weren't forefronted in Sword & Shield as implied, but at the same time, it's not like they aren't trying at all (unless the issues they describe are all a great big Dynamaxed lie).

Yeah, no.

Offering transfer support for only most-but-not-all of the available roster is not a "compromise" because that's not how Pokemon collecting works. That's not how teambuilding has worked thus far. If I have a team built in UltraSun and UltraMoon that I used in the Battle Tree or my huge backlog of teams that I've used in previous playthroughs, I'm not going to be breaking up my collection and "splitting" them between Home and Sword/Shield.

If they're only supporting some Pokemon in each game going forward, there simply is no point in supporting transferring at all because I'd rather just start over again than deal with the logistical headaches of having my collection one-foot-in-Sword/Shield-one-foot-out, and just having my collection in a sort of perpetual limbo.
 
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